


Bleak

by Acciofirewhiskey



Series: Bleak: Sherlock Holmes AU [1]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV), Sherlock Holmes (Downey films)
Genre: F/M, Gen, Sherlock Holmes AU, Victorian
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-22
Updated: 2014-12-04
Packaged: 2017-12-06 02:32:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 18,737
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/730577
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Acciofirewhiskey/pseuds/Acciofirewhiskey
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Detective Gold, partner Dr. Whale at his side, follows the trail of Lord Sutterland, while trying his best to avoid the dangerous path emotional entanglements, when world-traveling thief, Belle French, reenters his life. Rumbelle Sherlock Holmes AU</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“London’s so bleak this time of year, not that I’m pining for Maine. I much prefer to travel during the winter.”

 

Inspector Eleazar Gold wakes instantly at the sound of her voice and smells tea—strong, just the way he likes it.

 

“I brought you these,” she says, kneeling before him, sprawled and disheveled on the floor to set the tea bricks on his little coffee table. She’s gorgeous, in a blue satin gown, the exact color of her eyes, “Just a few things I picked up during my world travels. Jasmine, your favorite, and then the chamomile, for your sleep habits. A batch of red all the way from Cape Town.” She stands and with a sway of her skirts, returns to the fire for the kettle and tea service, “Thought we might have a little tea party, and while I waited for someone to wake up, I took the liberty of raiding your library. You have that new essay from the Baron Avebarry. I borrowed it, I do hope you don’t mind—you know how I love Lubbock—but while I was browsing, I found something rather odd, a file, with my name on it. _Theft of relic vase from a nunnery in Geneva…_ ”

 

As she reads from the folder, distracted, the unkempt detective scrambles to his feet and races to the desk where he upturns the papers on his latest case, quietly as he can. Next he checks to ensure his safe remains locked and secure.

 

“ _Missing documents lead to the resignation of youngest Commodore, Killian Jones. Scandalous affair ends in the disinheritance of Hapsburg prince in favor of his younger, twin brother—_ “

 

As she turns back, tray in hand, he knocks down her framed portrait, where it had been placed prominently on his desk—strictly in a professional capacity, of course. She eyes him sharply. Inspector Gold picks up one of the tea bricks and brings it close to his nose, making no show of being caught in the act, “I was merely observing your methods, in the event the proper authorities ask me to hunt you down.”

 

“Ah, I see,” she says, smirking, “what I don’t see is my name in any of these articles.”

 

“And yet, your signature was more than evident, dearie,” He answers softly, his hand discarding the brick in favor of her slim waist. She leans in to the touch, but as she leans upward, a smile playing on her lips, begins to close her blue, blue eyes, he deftly slips his hand beneath her bustle, pulling out an antique lamp. “Ah, and this wouldn’t be the Sultan’s missing lamp, I presume, or just another souvenir?”

 

Setting down the tea service, she tells him, “Let’s not dwell on the past.” She snatches back the lamp and returns it to where it had been nothing more than additional padding, before sitting. She motions to the seat opposite, “Shall we?”

 

Gold sits down, but when he lifts the teacup, he eyes it closely, looking for any traces of foul play, suspicious as always.

 

“It’s just a cup of tea,” she tells him.

 

He blinks toward her before running his finger around the rim of the teacup, looking for stray powder, and though he finds none, he replies tartly, “And sharp enough to cut, if I recall.” He smells the brew and wrinkles his brow—most likely harmless, but one could never be too careful.

 

“It’s Pu’er,” she says, “from the—“

 

“Orient, I know.” He finally gulps down the spicy drink and sets the cup down loudly, “Spare me the geography lesson, m’dear,” he tells her. She rolls her eyes and reaches for her own cup, but he catches her wrist, the left one, the one currently missing a ring. “A history lesson, however, would be much appreciated.”

 

She twists out of his hold and reclines back, comfortable like she sat in her own boudoir, “Oh Godfrey Gaston, he was boring and bossy and he snored.” She shrugs and tells him the obvious, “I’m Belle French, once again.” A beat passes, and of course, the retired contralto can’t sit still. She stands and dances across the room (and Gold remembers a happier time, a time when she was his housekeeper—vast improvement over Nanny Lucas, if not for the stealing and the backstabbing).

 

Belle tugs on the curtains and shakes her head, “Some things never change, I see.”

 

He scoffs, “Yes, you’re still a thief, and I’m still unimpressed.” He stares her down and finally asks the question he’s been wondering since he first awoke, “Who are you working for this time, Belle?”

 

She smiles at him, bright as day, (bright as when he’d caught her from that ladder), “This room would be so much cheerier with a little light, you know.”

 

“Not going to tell me, I see,” he turns away from her, from the drapes, from the light. He looks to the tea service, stares down the chipped cup it hosts, “I’ll have to find out the hard way.”

 

She offers a patronizing look he doesn’t see, but knows she gives, and removes a coin purse from her skirts. She sets it beside one of the vial racks on his desk. “Don’t bother,” Gold tells her automatically, “you couldn’t pay me money enough to take your case.”

 

Belle sighs and dons her cloak. “Then consider it the first installment on a down payment.” As she walks past, he picks up his cello, ready to be done with the interview, with the memories. “I’ll be staying at the Grand, for when you change your mind. They gave me our old room.” The last she says as she slips her hand over his shoulder, with the ease of one who has touched another extensively, for a lengthy period of time (with a level of comfort that the detective never feels with anyone else), and he hears it when she returns her portrait to standing. He plays a few notes, waiting to hear her exit.

 

At the sound of the door closing, he scrambles to his feet, not a moment to lose…


	2. Chapter 2

“How is it the only woman you’ve ever loved is a world class criminal?”

 

“Whale, I’d hardly use the term ‘world class’,” he says, wiping the stage makeup from his face with an already spent pocket square, then adds, in more of a mutter, “or ‘love’.”

 

His companion chuckles, the day’s paper in hand, “I may be a doctor, Gold, but I know love, and you’re in it—or _were_ , once.”

 

“That’s an incorrect assessment of my symptoms, and if I could explain—“

 

He shakes his head, “I’ve been thinking, Gold, and what’s more, it’s my professional opinion that you, sir, are a masochist.”

 

“If you would just allow me to explain—“

 

“No, allow me: she’s the only one who has ever outsmarted you. Bested you, not once, but twice. Made a right arse out of you, as I recall.”

 

“Yes, yes, you’ve had your fun, Victor,” the Inspector says, removing the false nose he’d been sporting. “ _Now_ will you let me tell you what I learned about who the little clip works for?”

 

“Not quite,” the doctor says, and a naughty idea comes to mind. “You’ll have to admit it first.”

 

“I— _what_?”

 

“Admit that she beat you. I want to hear you say it.”

 

The older man, sighs and the doctor smirks, for he who knew the detective better than any, save the man’s son, knew how much the price would gnaw at Gold’s pride. It was simply too delicious a price to pass up.

 

“She—“ he rolls his eyes and spits out, “the little lifter beat me, alright.”

 

“Twice.”

 

“Lord, Victor—“

 

“ _Gold_.”

 

“Fie,” he scowls, “fine, fine, you win, Whale. She beat me. Twice.” He smacks the doctor’s newspaper with his faux beggar’s cane, “ _Now_ will you let me share my tale?”

 

Smug as he ever is, on the rare occasions he outsmarts his dear friend, Victor Whale says, “I wish you would.”

 

-

 

“Hold the door,” the lyrical voice calls.

 

Victor Whale smiles broadly for the lovely woman, who passes by quickly (engaged he may be, but blind he certainly is not).

 

“Thanks, doctor,” she says, and in that moment, he recognizes the beautiful face. If he wasn’t moving out, he’d be worried about what this meant for his former partner, but with his impending nuptials, he can only hope that Gold would use his head and not his heart (or any other organ not suited in the particular to critical thought) this time ‘round, where it came to the late Miss Isabelle French.

 

He hurries up the staircase to get to the bottom of the situation, when his friend comes bounding toward him. Dr. Whale stops immediately, “Gold what _are_ you wearing?”

 

The inspector makes no note of the other man, turning instead to the window on the landing, which he opens. The sharp winter winds blow in. “And, is that—Gold, is that a black tooth?”

 

“Indeed, it is, I used a variation on boot black.” The brilliant oddity makes a grimace, “Not pleasant to the taste buds, but does the job admirably enough.” He thrusts his cane at Whale, “Hold this.” He begins to climb through the open window.

 

“Just what exactly are you doing?” he asks, but the detective doesn’t answer, perched on the windowsill, “And tell me that wasn’t—“

 

Gold grabs the cane back and answers smartly, “It wasn’t.” He pushes himself off the window, the landing reverberating loudly, and Whale, looking out the window after him shakes his head. He shuts it, as he hears the man call his name. He goes to tell Mrs. Lucas to unlock the back door, before going to his own rooms, leaving Gold to his adventures, for the doctor fully intended to leave all that well behind him.

 

-

 

He had not expected the doctor to hold him up quite so long, but Gold catches up to her soon enough. He follows her through the streets, mingling past and through the stalls and merchants with their wares. He adds a tattered, tartan scarf and corncob pipe to his disguise along the way.

 

She almost spots him, as she turns into the dark alleyway, but he ducks behind the corner just in time.

 

As Belle French continues down the alley, a young man appears before her. “Care to see a card trick, mum?” The woman makes a pleasantly surprised sound, and Gold frowns as the stranger tips his top hat to her. “I’ll even let you set the suit, because you’re so sweet.”

 

“Oh,” she gasps, “my lucky day.” As she searches in her cloak for the needed coin, Gold watches out of sight, noting when the two-bit excuse for a sideshow magician pulls what can only be a drugged handkerchief from his pocket.

 

Still looking down, Belle murmurs, “I don’t know if I have enough…”

 

The man shrugs, and stalks toward her, raising the hand with the handkerchief, “Nothing to lose our heads over, love.”

 

Just as the man pushes his hand toward Belle’s face and Gold steps forward to intervene, she pulls a hidden knife out from inside her bilious sleeve. Taken completely by surprise, the man stumbles, and she presses the blade—which the inspector recognizes, a stolen artifact, German in origin, from his very own collection—to the man’s outdated cravat. She smiles and with her free hand she takes the man’s hat for herself, “Suits me better, don’t you think?”

 

The man doesn’t answer, and she winks, before slipping her hand into his jacket. She pulls out his coin purse and pockets it. “Oh, what’s this?” The man makes to put up a fight, but Belle draws the blade across his cheek, close as any half-penny shave. “Thank you,” she whispers demurely, slipping away.

 

“Now that’s the Isabelle French I know,” the detective mumbles to himself.

 

He follows her through a faire and another market. She backtracks and finally slips into a black, unmarked carriage, though expensive, by the looks of it. He creeps, hobbling with false limp, close enough to hear out the open window.

 

“He’ll do it,” Belle French tells the man opposite her, as soon as the carriage door shuts.

 

“Well done, Miss French, that’s precisely why I hired you,” his low voice replies.

 

“It should take little more than a day, and Gold will have our man.”

 

“He’d better. Le Roy was the key to what Sutterland was doing. He’s essential to the plan—“

 

 _“Oi, bloody hell, can’t you see where you’re walking, old man?”_ the coachman hollers out.

 

The unwashed beggar appears at the window, his head, just barely peeking up into sight. “Spare a bit’o somefin, gov?” He sticks a sun-spotted hand into the carriage, “Been rubbin’ these calluses—“

 

The shadowed man throws up his arm, extending the automatic pistol in the poor tramp’s face.

 

“God save the queen,” the desperate old man pleads, scurrying away (and Belle uses the spare moments to catch her breath again). “God save the queen, gov…”

 

-

 

“This man intrigues me, Whale,” the inspector says at long last finishing his tale. Face clean, he paces the room, finally back to his usual state. “He’s got French on edge.”

 

“That’s no easy feat,” the doctor says. “I mean if the girl wasn’t even afraid of _you_ , then she’s made of something tougher, well except after you—“

 

“Yes, yes, I remember, Whale, no need to drum up the past, but true enough: she’s intimidated. She’s afraid of him.”

 

“And yet, she works for him?” the younger of the pair says, his mind always following a logical train verbally.

 

“Indeed.”

 

“I know, it’s no longer my place,” the doctor begins, turning talk to the practical, “but it would be my advice to leave this one alone.”

 

Gold shrugs. “It’s not as if I’ve much of a choice, doctor, when I all too recently find myself paying an arm and a leg in rent.” He points his false cane at his friend, “Thanks to you.”

 

“Get that out of my face,” he says, eyeing his old partner.

 

The inspector smirks, “It’s in my hand.”

 

Whale sighs at the infuriating but logical point, “Then get what’s in your hand out of my face—“

 

They’re cut off when the door opens to Inspector Humbert, of Scotland Yard, “Gold, good you’re home.”

 

“Oh, Graham, lost again, are we? Need me to show you the way back to the Yard?” he asks, and in his moment of distraction, the doctor bats away the cane. He turns back to Whale and scowls.

 

“It’s Lord Sutterland, sir,” the police officer says, turning both men’s heads, “you need to come with me immediately…”


	3. Chapter 3

The discovery of the raven-haired, amateur electrician, Le Roy in Lord Sutterland’s grave had been something of a shock to Humbert’s men. Gold took it in stride.

 

“It appears we found your woman’s dwarf.”

 

“The correct terminology would be Midget, Whale,” he answers, eyeing the pickax buried alongside the decaying corpse, “and so it would appear.”

 

The doctor sighs, “I’ve offended you.”

 

“Not in the slightest,” Gold says, slyly pocketing the late man’s watch, whilst the bumbling police crew looked to the belligerent graveyard attendant, “I simply would rather not have one connected with my practice misrepresenting foreshorten peoples—or formerly, rather.”

 

After a lecture from Humbert over the exact definition of _dead_ and some mild cajoling on Gold’s part the pair sets off in search of Le Roy’s residence. They find a number of clues, but on the whole the endeavor puts them at a loss, when they end up fighting their way through the docks, destroying two steamboats, and with innumerable bumps, bruises, and black eyes between them at the hand of a large man, of French origin, named _Colombe_ …

 

As well as in the custody of the Yard overnight for destruction of private property and disturbance of the peace (the latter, Whale implores, is simply Gold’s default lifestyle. Gold on the other hand had simply offered the warden a cigar. The warden had declined).

 

Of course, the doctor’s tarty fiancé arrived in the morning to bail out her newest kill. “Well, if it isn’t your little beast,” the inspector tells his friend, spotting the dark-haired woman.

 

Of course, the future Mrs. Victor Whale only brings enough notes for one. Gold rolls his eyes, as he watches his friend walk free, thinking of the night he’d finally met the woman. Dressed all in red, bejeweled, young and far too pretty for his colleague, he’d deduced her nothing more than a scraping black widow.

 

The woman had disagreed—or so said an upturned wine glass over his head.

 

He’d taken dinner alone, followed by round of matches at the bar. He’d been drunk enough to take immense pleasure stretching out the matches, toying and teasing at his prey—that is until he spotted _her_ , completely unfit for a place such as the dirty house of revelry, and yet completely at ease. She’d winked, given him a token (an embroidered pocket square—also originally of his own collection), and he’d taken a punch to the jaw, as well as a new case, apparently, all leading back to Sutterland.

 

(But then that was always the way with Belle, breathtaking—and damned dangerous to men’s health.)

 

So really, all this mess was the doctor’s fiancé’s fault (and thereby Whale’s—if he had not been so insistent to move out none of this would have happened).

 

When Humbert arrives to tell him that his own bail has been posted, Gold wonders if Belle and her mysterious employer await him in the carriage. However, he finds something altogether different. “I’m terribly sorry about this,” a soft voice tells him, before forcing a hood over his head…

 

-

 

When they remove the hood, he finds himself in a very fine parlor room. Gothic revival in style, pointed and sharp.

 

Not at all to his own more eclectic tastes.  

 

“Ah, help arrived at last,” says the older man, seated across from him. “I do apologize for the unconventional method of summoning you. I’m sure it’s quite a mystery as to where you are and who I am.”

 

“As to where I am,” Gold answers, “I was lost, admittedly, three blocks from the impound, but was saved, by the flower shop on Saffron Hill, the only to carry the Bourbon Rose this time of year, with it’s unmistakable fragrance, after that it was quite simple to follow the route out of the city, the tell-tale bump on the second bridge over the Thames, leading to what can only be your summer residence, _Lord Spencer_.”

 

The older man opens his mouth to reply, but Gold continues unimpeded, “And as to your identity, sir, you’ve negligently left letters addressed to your person, both personal and in your official capacity as Chief Inspector, but as to your _real_ identity, that too is easily enough realized.” He points to the man’s hand, “the ring, clearly a symbol of Order of the Reul Ghorm, of which you are the current head.”

 

Sitting back, and truly, more than a little smug, he finishes, “The only mystery, is why you bothered blindfolding me at’ll.”

 

“Precedent, I suppose,” the formerly grandiose man answers, more than a little taken back.

 

A side door (apparently, hidden, but Gold’s been aware of it from the moment they’d removed the cover) opens, revealing two men, one young, the other middle aged. “I daresay we’ve got the right man,” the older of the two says, and there’s something duplicitous in the man’s expression—or perhaps the detective’s anxiety is getting the better of him this afternoon.

 

“Detective Holmes,” Spencer says, rising, “May I present Sir Glass, the home secretary, and my son, the Ambassador Nolan, home recently from the colonies.”

 

He nods curtly to the two men, and smirks. “Fellow Order members, I presume.”

 

“Then you are aware of some of our practices, Mr. Gold?” the young ambassador asks (and Gold wonders just how much gold bought him the ambassadorship).

 

“Indeed, I find the blind mysticism of fanatics fine insight into man’s nature toward herd mentality—“

 

“Be a skeptic all you like, but our practices are thousands of years old,” the Lord bites back.

 

“They’ve kept the nations of the world on a trajectory toward what’s good and right,” his son adds.  

 

Gold chuckles at the lad’s blind faith. Oh, to be that young and naïve—the detective would rather hang, “Yes, but I don’t believe our Lord Sutterland saw it that way did he? Or should I say, your adoptive brother?” The Inspector looks to Spencer, “you have told the ambassador of his adoption, have you not?” He takes in the expression of the younger man and adds, “Ah, _not_ , apparently.”

 

The lord gapes down at the smaller man like a fish out of water, “How did you…?”

 

“Know? Quite simple really, the resemblance being unmistakable for one, and the eyes, a rare iris color, only passed through direct bloodline.” He offers a little more serious, without the touch of derision, in the ambassador’s direction, “clearly absent, in your preferred offspring.”

 

“Incredibly few are privy to that information,” the Lord answers not looking to his younger, adopted son, “Sutterland was conceived during one of our rituals, his mother, though not my wife,” he pauses, looking awkwardly between his son and the detective, “was a powerful practitioner, but unfortunately not enough to survive giving birth to him. When my son fell into the darker tenants of the faith, my wife and I tried to conceive a child, but were unsuccessful.”

 

“Charming,” Gold says, mockingly, “hide away one son, buy another—“

 

“You cannot possibly understand the choices I have had to make,” Spencer says, angrily, “but that’s not why we brought you here.”

 

“Oh, I know. You want me to find Sutterland, back from grave.”

 

“Find him and stop him. He’s a madman.”

 

“As home secretary, I have considerable influence over the police force,” the third man in the group speaks up at long last, “We’ll give you any assistance that we can,” Sir Glass offers.

 

“And of course, a large monetary reward,” Spencer finishes.

 

“Now that is the great benefit to being a consulting detective: I am at my leisure to pick and choose my clients,” he tells them, coldly (though the ambassador, little more than a boy, stares into the room, stunned). “I’ll do it, but not for you, and certainly for no price you could pay.” Gold turns on his heel and walks out, but adds, “I do have a parting query, Lord Spencer.”

 

“What?”

 

“If everyone of Sutterland’s blood relation is dead, how long do expect to survive?” he calls. “Food for thought.”


	4. Chapter 4

After her employer leaves, Belle French decides to take a long bath.

 

The indulgence ends up lasting from midmorning—they’d met for brunch, and as much as she liked that indulgence as well, it had not been a pleasant interview (they never were with this one)—until the early afternoon. She’d taken along the Lubbock essay, a philosophical one, given to a group of university students, the kind she preferred to his scientific or archeological musings. She’d gotten a few watermarks on the pages, and smirks, hoping her lender won’t be too put out (but well knowing the opposite to be much more the likely).

 

When she emerges from the steamy bathroom, rosy and perfumed, wrapped in a towel, curls unpinned, she’s not surprised to find the man himself rummaging through the papers on her table set for two. Her former landlord and employer (as well as one-time mark as well as that _other thing_ too—the list with Eleazar just went on and on and _on_. That’s the thing about them, no matter how many times they ended, Belle never felt that they were _finished_ ) being known to never be without a set of lock picks.

 

“If I’d known I was to be having company, I would have dressed for the occasion,” Belle says, teasingly.

 

“How surprising, considering I know your preferred method for conducting business transactions,” Gold insults, pausing his search to briefly turn to observe her, and with perfect timing—she had been a prima donna, once upon a time, after all—she drops the towel. He’s thrown for more than a moment, but then she’s walking, all nonchalance of an already once-jilted lover behind her dressing screen.

 

Clearing his throat, the detective says, “I found your man.”

 

“Oh, and where was he?” Belle asks, deliberating between the Japanese kimono and the silk sari from Calcutta. She always wore her exotic souvenirs while in her own apartments, all by herself  (that or her under-things, all lace and satin frills, hardly amounting to anything at all). She liked to remind herself of the places she’d seen, the adventures she’d had--how far she’d come. Feeling particularly indulgent, she decides upon the kimono, which she can tie to her liking: in the front and low, to give Gold the best view.

 

“Though I hardly delude myself in believing you ignorant in the matter, dear, but the good doctor and I found him dead,” he says, examining a letter from the colonies and a stack of music from the University of Leeds choir, “in Sutterland’s tomb, no less.” He holds up the sheets, “Thinking of returning to the stage, are we? I must say the production would be quite the step down from Milan.”

 

“Hardly,” she tells him, adjusting the ornate fabric.

 

She hasn’t sung in years. She frowns at the memory, but then such was life—fleeting and terribly tragic. Like all the best operas.

 

“From your employer, then?" he queries, "Is that who sent the sheets to you, the professor?”

Belle’s hands freeze mid-knot.

“Your employer is a professor, is he not? I didn’t get a look at the face, but I noted the chalk dust on his lapel.”

“False cane,” she says, putting two and two together (and getting too many falsehoods) with the old beggar man in disguise, “nice touch.”

“Though I wonder as to where he holds his lectures, considering how well he armed himself.”

“Now who’s talking business matters?” she asks, lightly, “but that brings up an excellent point. With that case closed, apparently, this becomes something of a personal house call.” Finally ready, she walks out before him, and that tingle occurs that she gets whenever he looks at her—and after all this time, she’d always imagined that pesky feeling wouldn’t last, but here it is, and here she stands weak at the knees at the sight of him, unkempt and brilliant and striking and worn as always.

 

She shakes off the macabre and waltzes up to him, “Though I do hope my employer doesn’t come looking for a refund on that down payment I gave you.”  

 

He walks over and tugs on the ends of the silken chord at her tiny waist. It’s a pale blue, so light as to almost be periwinkle. “That’s not the traditional way it’s worn,” he says, and himself allows an indulgence, dragging a finger, dirt under the nail, up and across each collarbone, so light that Belle half imagines him to not be touching her skin at all, that it’s simply the sheer electricity she feels closing the space between them.

 

“Hm,” she says, and she almost hides the shiver in her voice, “since you’re so well-versed in tradition, see if you can’t open this bottle.” She hands him a Bordeaux, the kind they’d always had in this very room, on days like these—one of their traditions.

 

He accepts the wine, but as he deftly twists the opener into the cork, his eyes never leave her. “Personal or not, you’re in over your head, Belle.” The bottle finally gives way and a little pop echoes in the room. He pours the wine and passes her one of the glasses, but doesn’t let go once she takes hold, “And this isn’t personal.”

 

Gold finally lets go, and she swirls her glass coyly, “Well, we were always better in a professional capacity, anyway.”

 

“ _Belle_ ,” he says, scolding, “you know that whoever killed Le Roy will have set you as their next target. Sutterland’s covering his tracks, to be sure.” He picks up his own glass contemplatively, “I believe you may truly be in over your head this time.”

 

She ignores him, “I’ve never been in over my head—thought I was, more than once,” she shrugs and watches his eyes as they watch her exposed skin, “and even more than once with you.”

 

“Well you are now, dearie,” setting down the glass, he picks up one of her forged passports, “leave now, disappear—you’re quite good at that.”

 

“Letting me go again, are you, Eli?”

 

“Hardly,” He rolls his eyes, “if you stay, you’re coming with me into protective custody. Humbert’s not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but he’ll protect you.”

 

“If Sutterland’s coming for me, then he’s coming for you as well,” she sets her glass down and reaches a hand toward his on the table, their fingers just barely touching (and there’s that electricity Le Roy taught her all about again), “We could leave, runaway together? See the world?” She pushes him (she’s always pushing him), twining her fingers into his, “What if we were brave enough to trust each other, to believe one another?”

 

He pulls out of her hold, briskly, his breath coming out almost a hiss, and says, ““We could never do that.” He picks up his glass again, gesturing with it “You’re not listening. You’re either going with me to the police station or the railway station.”

At that he grimaces and downs the glass in one go.

 

She frowns, with a sigh, “You always never had quite enough courage,” she says, hand on her hip.

 

“Beside the point.” The man blinks a little out of tempo, “Now,” he coughs, “which is it to be?”

 

Belle French, thief extraordinaire, stares at the detective, waiting on the effects of the sedative.

 

“You decide,” he says, before losing his footing and stumbling to the ground. “Which’ll it be?”

 

She races to him, catching his head so as to not let him fall into the fireplace mantle, “I told you once before, no one decides my fate but me.” She kneels down and takes his face into her hands, “Stubborn man, can you taste the comet?”

 

Gold’s eyes focus on the syringe lying beneath the table she’d used to add the sedating agent to the bottle of wine before they lose focus completely.

 

Belle runs her fingers through his long hair (and mangy though it is today, she doesn’t mind in the least), “Why couldn’t we just leave and start over?”

 

“Never,” he mumbles, half asleep already.

 

On a desperate impulse, she indulges, kissing him hard on the mouth. The woman throws her entire being into it, pressing against him, pulling him into her—he, her one true love.

 

Belle gives up when she hears him begin to snore.

 

-

 

When Gold awakens, naked and handcuffed, he takes a moment to appreciate the girl’s irony before cursing her (as well as his own stupidity).

 

Luckily, he only mildly terrifies the chambermaid (and after all, dramatic entrances are something of a specialty of his), who misinterprets his very direct instructions. This leads to the police involvement, and Humbert finding him to decipher the next piece of the Sutterland puzzle: the murder of Lord Albert Spencer.

 

The detective’s hardly surprised by Spencer’s death, finding it rather timely in fact, nor with the bumbling police having drained the bathtub and removed the body, thereby destroying what little evidence he had hoped to find. Of course, he discovers the secret Reul Ghorm chamber and spirits away with all necessary articles to be examined closer at his leisure in his home on Spinner Street.

 

As he enters the premises and sees that Whale’s coat and hat are absent from the hooks on the wall, a plan occurs to him. Gold walks upstairs, in a much pleasanter mood than before and ready to begin his work in the doctor’s all too pristine quarters...


	5. Chapter 5

 Gold smirks when he hears the tell-tale sounds of his partner racing to catch up.

“Here,” the doctor says, thrusting a revolver toward the detective, “you forgot this.”

“Ah, so I did,” he admits, tucking the firearm into his jacket, “and you might take a touch more caution where explosives are concerned, doctor.” Whale scowls to the other’s smirk and doesn’t speak until they’re a respectable distance down the Thames, toward a factory on Nine Elms, as correctly deduced by said man (though Gold had already figured as much, and half an hour prior, at that).

It’s dark, with the exception of Marco’s glowing pipe, and Gold rather likes the chill to the air, heightening his already keen senses. He points to the in-progress renovations on the Tower Bridge, “Ah, look sharp—those towering structures, combination bascule and suspension bridge, the very first in fact.” When Whale makes no note, looking, in fact in the very opposite direction, the detective remains unperturbed, continuing, “Most innovative. The industry of empire never sleeps, it would seem.”

Gold awaits comment, his dour feelings on the sentiment of patriotism usually stirring some passion in his partner. Again, the doctor says nothing. “I must say, your grand gift for silence, Whale, makes you an invaluable asset—“

The doctor finally caves shoving the other man harshly, enough so as to cause him to falter back, hitting the edge of the boat, “Admit it,” the man speaks up, “you did that on purpose.”

“Do keep your voice down, Whale!” Gold censures in a false-whisper. “If you insist upon tagging along for these adventures, then do remember that we travel incognito.”

Whale fumes silently, awaiting a more proper answer.

Yes, of course, he’d left the gun there on purpose. His friend would be a fool to think otherwise (and Gold was hardly one to suffer a fool lightly, not to mention work and cohabitate with one). “On the topic of the gun, I haven’t the vaguest idea to what you’re referring, Whale.”

 The doctor shakes his head, “You’re impossible.” Whale turns away, but stops, pointing a finger at Gold’s chest, “That’s my waistcoat!”

The detective steps back, a possessive hand going to the buttons on the article of clothing, “I thought we’d agreed it was too small for you.”

“But I’d like it back.”

“I thought we’d agreed.”

“I want it back,” he increases his volume pulling on the garment.

Gold finally throws off his grasp, but caves, “Fine,” he unbuttons it fast and shoves it to the doctor. Once waistcoat in hand, Whale glares at it for a moment, before looking the detective straight in the eye and tossing the vest over the side of the deck.

The old captain laughs, shaking his head, “You’ouldn’t last one day in the navy.”

The two men, despite being at odds moments earlier, both fight the slightest of upturns in their mouths—all’s well as it ever could be, with the doctor’s impending nuptials. “Gold, you’re sure there isn’t any other means of alternative water transportation?” Whale asks.

“None better than Marco, been through hell and back on the high seas, you could say,” Gold tells his friend as he takes over the helm for the elderly captain, “practically raised in the belly of a fish that one.”

“Well, he certainly drinks like one.”

“Oi, look who’s finally found’a sense of humor,” the captain says. “Though only just a _sense_.”

Chuckling the detective, manning the helm with one hand, pats the doctor on the back with the other, “Chin up, old boy, we’ve not much farther to go.”

Marco turns to Gold, “I better takeover, gov, gets a bit tricky up ‘ere.”

“Quite right—river navigation’s always been just outside my purview.”

-

After Marco dropped them off at the dock, they cautiously enter the warehouse, only to find hidden behind barrels and pickling supplies, masses of electrical wires and circuits, amber rods, a set of Franklin bells and Leyden jars, as well as vials, test tubes, and mechanized pieces—even a grimy aquarium with a pair of sad-looking electric eels.

“This looks familiar,” Whale says in a sour tone, recalling their time and subsequent fight at the late Le Roy’s.  

“Indeed, all that’s missing is a drunken midget and an over-sized Frenchman,” Gold says, examining one of the larger units with a large metal conductor extending out from the top of the contraption, “What the devil does Sutterland intend with this?”

“I’ve not the faintest, but is this—“ Dr. Whale asks, prodding a cylindric stack of what he believes to be copper wheels.

“A Voltaic pile-–a battery, in the vernacular,” Gold cuts him off, moving closer to examine the device.

“I know what it is—“

“I’ve never examined one this close before,” he continues, ignoring the doctor, “but some time ago did attempt a similar homemade sort of machine…”

Shaking his head, Whale continues to explore the factory, but a table catches his eye. Running his finger along its edge, he notes that the dust appears brushed in the direction farther inside. “I think someone’s been here, recently.”

“Of course they have, and moved something away as well—something large. Something mechanical—“

“How—“

“Look down, Whale, note the sawdust, to ease the weight, toward the waterfront,” he tells him, pointing to the floor. “We’re getting close. Be on your guard.”

Whale nods and continues to search for clues, but stops dumbfounded, upon looking to the far wall, “ _Gold_ , you’d better come see this.”

The detective moves to stand beside his friend, taking in the markings on the wall—written in what can only be one chosen ink. All the same he steps closer and swipes a finger before putting it to his tongue. “Yes, blood, as I suspected. Though not human, if I had to wager.” He traces the crescent moon and star figure, and translates the words he knows to be in Gaelic, “Reul Ghorm: that which rules the night—“

“ _Shall not know death—the morning and evening star, the great power, greater than all others._ ”

The voice bellows all around them, echoing through the clapboard factory, steam from the machinery melding with the fog from the Thames to create a terrifying backdrop to their saga.

“ _I warned you, Gold, that this was beyond your control, beyond your notions of right and wrong._ ” The voice—Sutterland—refers to his final request to see Gold before his hanging, and their cryptic words exchanged therein. The two men’s heads dart around, searching for its source.

“What a busy afterlife you’re living,” the detective yells out. “Seems you were throwing your money away when you purchased that headstone.”

“ _I want you to bear witness: tomorrow at midday, the world as you know it, will end, and I shall be installed as it’s rightful ruler.”_

“You’re not my ruler—if you’re so brave show your face right now and it’ll be the end of you,” Whale shouts.

Gold puts out a hand, “Save your breath and bullets, man.”

The doctor opens his mouth to tell his friend just exactly what _he_ can save, when the bellowing voice thins to a whisper, breaking the silence right behind them, from a space in the wooden slats. “ _In my benevolence, a gift…_ ”

The men start, turning, and Gold fires a full round of bullets into the wall—while Whale cringes holding his own gun aloft. “What was that about saving bullets?” Whale asks, and Gold frowns, rolling his eyes, as he works to reload, but a sound across the room draws their attention.

Wheels crank, and pickled hogs hung from chains roll forward on a rusty conveyor belt. Both men frown, “What’s all this then—“ Gold’s words cut off, when the incinerators fire up and something entirely different moves down the line. “Belle—“

Thief Isabelle French hangs, with wrists handcuffed above her head, gagged and struggling, in men’s cloth’s no less.

His to be sure…

“ _She followed you, Gold,”_ the voice returns to all around them, “ _a lamb led to the slaughter._ ”

The two men move at once, “Gold,” Whale calls tossing the other man his thick, winter coat, “this game was designed to hurt.”

The man nods without turning his head, eyes on the task at hand. In his mind, he counts, to time the run between fire blasts from the incinerator. At the proper moment, he runs, jumping and grasping onto the chains that hold the (impulsive, foolish, _damned headstrong_ ) woman. Gold presses close, to take as much of the heat as he can. The chains too, their metal takes in the burn of the fire, and both feel it.

“Bit warm in here, Whale. Do you plan on assisting at’all?” the detective yells round Belle’s head.

Gold hears the crank of a lever, and then feels the fires subside, the doctor finding the correct control. He turns to Belle, “In over your head yet, dearie?”

When Whale pulls the still-flaming coat from them, to stamp it out by foot, the conveyor belt pauses. Gold lets go and falls to the ground. At a pained sound from Belle, he swiftly unties the gag (though he notes, she tries to stifle it). “What ails?” he presses.

“My wrists—I can’t hold on,”

The men look up, and true enough, blood stains the cuffs of the Gold’s shirt.”

“Here, I’ll take your weight,” Whale says, sliding to allow the lady to sit on his shoulders.

She sighs in relief audibly, and both doctor and detective are glad for it, though Gold frowns at the man beneath Belle. “A leg up, old boy, if you’d be so kind,” he says, before stepping into the crook of the man’s elbow to take hold of the conveyor belt hook beside the caught thief.

(Whale calls out, as his back aches, and he wonders if Gold doesn’t attempt to make himself weightier on purpose.)

Taking a look at the cuffs, the detective frowns, “These German locks always give me trouble.” He reaches for a pin he knows to be hidden in her hair, when creaking of metal draws all three’s attention.

A circular saw springs to life, and the belt begins to creep forward—though the slower movements do no less to terrify the party, “It’s a buzz saw,” Gold says, as it slices through one of the hogs without the slightest hesitation.

Belle gasps, but he assures her, “All the time in the world.” He hops down to the ground, “Worry you not.”

It does nothing to either the woman, nor the man on whose shoulders she sits, “Gold—“

He doesn’t answer as he climbs on the boxes beside, to whack at the chains with a butcher knife. Of course, it does nothing.

“That’s not working,” Belle cries.

The true words strike him, and Gold pauses, eyes flitting for the answer. He looks, and spots an open space, below their feet, running in time with the conveyor. His mind begins to formulate a plan, spotting the water valve along the wall adjacent.

“ _Gold—_ “ Whale calls, more insistent this time, “hurry up!”

“I know,” he replies curt, as he knocks a bucket of bones into the open space, stopping the conveyor belt—temporarily, he knows, but it will buy them time. “Now don’t get excited.” He leans down and takes hold of the doctor’s belt, deftly unfastening it, “Turn off that valve—we’ll overload the thing.” With it, he positions himself in front of Belle, weighing down the belt further, just as the bones give way and the belt begins to move once again—though haltingly.

The doctor doesn’t understand the plan, until he turns the valve all the way he can and sees the water backlogged in the pipe overhead. Finally comprehending Gold’s intentions, he runs to the pair and takes hold the belt behind French. It sags with their weights, but at that moment, the final vertebrae shakes lose and the conveyor moves at full speed once again. “Gold, should we?”

“Not yet,” he snaps, watching the water pipe closely.

When it begins to sing—the saw slicing through the last hog before them—he says, “We bounce, on three, two, _one_ —“

The rusty parts give way, collapsing, and the trio fall to the ground—the doctor narrowly grabbing hold Belle’s suspenders before she would have flung headfirst into the saw. Whale pulls her backward slowly.

Now a safe distance back, she rests her head, panting into his chest, and heaves, “Thank you.”

The doctor raises his hands to pat her on the back, return the clearly distressed woman’s embrace, but one dark look from Gold and he himself steps back, uncomfortable, “I’ll just, get on after Sutterland.”

“You do that,” Gold says, plucking a pin from Belle’s disarray of curls. She jumps at the touch, still not quite recovered from the incident, but he turns her, and takes the cuffs into his hands. “Just me.” He tinkers with them, but finally they release, first one wrist and then the other, clattering to the ground.

He opens his mouth to remark on the irony of the handcuffs, but when she throws her arms about his neck, pressing her cheek to his, he finds himself quite at a loss for words.

“Thank you, Eli,” she breathes into his ear. When she kisses him there, dirty and sweaty and still shaking from fear and adrenaline, repeating thanks once more, it’s too much for the detective.

He removes her arms from his person, and instead looks her over for further injury. Finding none, Gold tugs two handkerchiefs from his pockets and wraps each around her tattered wrists. “You should see to those soon—lest they scar.”

“Eli—“

He raises his hands to silence her, “Stop.”

She frowns and speaks louder, reaching an arm to his elbow, “We have to talk—“ He pulls away, a grimy hand to his mouth, but she does not let him go, “I need—“

“ _You need?_ ” he yells, because she’s finally gotten to him. “Why did you follow me, you stupid, stupid girl?” He grips her shoulders, shaking her, “You could have _died_.”

“Let me explain—“

“What’s there to explain?” She opens her mouth, but he shakes her once more, “No, it’s all another job, another lie. I’ll not be lied to again, Belle.”

 “That’s not it,” she says, blue eyes wet and shining, and he looks away, because he could never stand to watch her and her crocodile tears. “I followed you because I—“

“No, no more,” Gold letting go of her arms as if she were the incinerator, she the saw. “We should help the doctor.” He stomps to the docks, and after a moment he hears her tiny steps behind him, doing everything in his power to not think on what she’d meant to say before he’d stopped her (and of course, failing miserably).

-

 Whale hurries to the docks, and emerges in time to see a gilded boat embarking—with Sutterland, very much in the flesh, seated like a king.

“Not my king,” the doctor mutters, and when the villain tips his hat to him, it’s the last straw for Whale. He runs toward the vessel, imaging he can perhaps jump aboard, but when he feels the wire catch on his ankle, hears the click of a trigger, he freezes.

(Perhaps he really is the fool he feels himself to be at times. What his father always said, anyway.)

He hears the footsteps then, and when his best friend, and the woman his friend loves appear, begin to run toward him, he yells to them, holding out a hand to stop them, just before the first of the explosions begin.

“ _Gold!_ ”

Wood chips fly, as fire ignites all around him. He feels himself as the power lifts and then drops him (much faster, the dropping). Twice that happens, before the ground grabs him and doesn’t let him go, the world spinning and spinning and spinning.

Still the explosions sound.

The last thing he sees before the world goes dark, is Gold sheltering the woman farther down the dock, farther from danger.

“ _Good, came to an arrangement_ ,” he thinks before fading out, “ _’bout bloody time._ ”

-

When Gold returns to consciousness, he tries to assess his physical situation.

 _Ears ringing_.

 _Pain in side, cracked rib, possibly two_.

_Face scratched, as well as arms and legs._

_On the ground, outside—_

_The docks. Whale_.

_WHALE._

He sits up, but promptly falls back to the ground. He opens his eyes, and though all things move but he, he sees neither his friend, nor _her_ — _Belle. Where is Belle—_

Suddenly arms cradle him, hauling him to stand. Everything in Gold’s body protests.

The face is obscure and his words as well, but finally, he realizes, Inspector Humbert holds him, “Gold—Gold, we have a warrant for your arrest.”

He pulls back frowning, still dizzy and pained.

“ _Sir—_ didn’t you hear me,” the man shakes him, repeating, “Sir Glass issued a warrant for your arrest. You’ve got to go now!”

“I can’t,” he manages, “not without—“

“Whale’s alive, but you’ll be no help to ‘im behind bars.” He shoves Gold in the opposite direction, “Now just get out of here. Go, sir, _go_.”

Gold nods, and turning away, stumbles once, and then he runs…


	6. Chapter 6

Dressed in her most expensive coat and gown, but the easier one, without all the fastenings in the back, as well as her muff, despite the unnatural warmth of the winter day, and hat, eschewed to cover the worst of the wounds, Belle French follows the conductor to the first class cabin.

 

(Even thieves had to travel in style—or run away, rather.)

 

“’Ere we are, mum.” The man stops before the door, holding it for the lady, motioning her up the two metal steps, “Anymore bags to be loadin’?”

 

“No, no,” she assures him with a cheery smile. She’d only the time to pack her most essential of pawnables from her apartments at the Grand, but as she ascends the first step, she turns back, “Will the train be departing on time?”

 

“There’s been a delay, ma’am, but won’t be much longer now, I’m sure.” With a tip of his hat the man’s on his way, and Belle exchanges the steamy platform for the cool air of the cabin room. She seats herself on a sedan chair, ensuring as she sits that the velvet of her bustle remains splayed in the proper direction. Once settled, she takes a deep breath, but finds herself no less on edge.

 

He’ll not forgive her this time, this last betrayal.

 

“The train departs when I tell it to,” the unmistakable voice calls from the far end of the closed train car. She startles and turns, spotting her former employer in the shadows, as she’d found he liked best, “and you leave my employment when I allow you to.”

 

It’s true, she fears him, but does her best to conjure up feelings of indignation. She fiddles with her mink muff (Russian, a gift from her opera days), “No one allows me to _do_ anything,” she mutters, and when she continues, looks him in the eye, or at least, where she imagines his eyes to sit, hidden and obscured in the dark, “I fulfilled my contract, I did what you asked: Le Roy’s dead, found in Sutterland’s tomb. So that’s us finished.”

 

He leans forward chucking, it’s a gleeful sound, and serves to only terrify her further, “If you think I have any interest in what that fool Sutterland does, you’re stupider than I thought.”

 

Belle bites her lip, looking away, to the windows. She can see a few people, barely make out their impressions for the steam of the locomotive engines.

 

“You know why I hired you.” Yes, of course she knows. One doesn’t survive the hell of the streets and winters in Maine without learning a thing or two. “I hired you to manipulate Gold’s feelings for you, not succumb to them.”

 

She raises a hand, attempting to brush past her eye, but look as if she only means to adjust her hat. She fails, for she feels the specter’s eyes watching her, and only serves to graze and irritate the line of three scratches down her high cheekbone. “You don’t get to tell me how I feel,” Belle bites out, and to her own credit, the tenor of her voice shakes minimally.

 

“And you still don’t get it,” he clicks his tongue, making a tsk-ing sound, at her show of weakness, “These emotional entanglements tend to lead us down—how to say—dangerous paths, lead us to make deals we don’t understand. You know that at least, hm?” He asks her rhetorically.

 

Her employer chuckles again, “Appears you’ve made a deal you didn’t quite understand, Miss French.” Turning serious, he pats his hand, the miniscule firearm hidden there, in his cuff clanking for the movement, “Finish the job: get me what Le Roy was working on, or the next dead body will be Eleazar Gold.”

 

-

 

Ruby Morstan arrives at the hospital as soon as she receives word in the early morning hours of her fiancés admittance there. She dresses quickly, in the gown she’d worn the day prior, a simpler one, for about the house (though a flattering fit, for she’d hoped that Victor would call, as he said he might, though now understanding why he had not. She’d waited for him, longer than usual, long enough for her mother to shake her head).

 

Ruby finds her promised, much worse than expected—though alive, so for that much she stands thankful—and raises quite the ruckus, demanding his wounds be seen to immediately.

 

Her efforts end in the futile, and she wishes very much her mother, who had a way of most often getting what she wanted from others, had come with her, but the matron did not approve of her Victor Whale, despite his profession, despite his decoration in the Afghan War, and even despite his surprising fidelity to Ruby. She had not gone with her daughter to the hospital before first light that morning.

 

She returns to the room for admitted patients, awaiting further treatment for minor enough, external wounds—though she’d hardly call the gaping injuries about his neck and shoulder minor, but when she wraps her arms around her chest, feeling very helpless, she looks up to see a white coat at the foot of her husband-to-be’s bedside.

 

She walks over, her skirts skittering along the floor behind, wanting to thank the man, but just before she reaches a hand to his arm, the gray-haired doctor turns and walks to a table at the other end of the room.

 

“Sir,” Ruby begins, but stops, noting an odd familiarity about the man’s gait, as well as minimal stature.

 

“The surgeon should be along shortly,” the doctor says, without turning to look at her, in a thick accent, that she can only assume to be German.

 

She eyes him for a moment, before going to Victor’s side, to examine the doctor’s work: a row of bloody, criss-crossing stitches, and she, having been privy to more than one of her fiancés efforts at the same sort of wound, knows it to be a piss-poor job.

 

“He should be able to rest now,” the doctor says, turning for the exit.

 

“Excuse me,” she calls, in a cold tone, “Is that really the best you can do? Looks like wolves have been at him or something.”

 

“That’s debatable,” the man answers, after a moment’s deliberation. She eyes him closely. He wears an outrageously largely nose, mustache and spectacles, “I must see to my other patients now.”

 

With speed unseemly in a woman—as her mother oft reminds—Ruby blocks his path, “Doctor, wait—“

 

“Sorry, dearie,” the man sneers, brushing her aside to move past, his accent dropping a touch.

 

She knows for certain then. “Doctor,” she calls, but he does not stop. She makes chase, following him out into the dimly lit hall, “Please!”

 

He stops then, at that.

 

She approaches slowly, as she would a wounded animal—and what else is this strange man, whom her fiancé loves and she can’t understand in the least, this man who opens his mouth to insult more often than observe, who always seems to be the unseen manipulator to every daring deed in the papers, dragging her Victor along for the ride.

 

“I know you care for him, as much as I do.” She hears a heavy sigh, and the next, she offers to ease the guilt she knows must burden him down, must burden him against the task at hand (and no, Ruby does not regret the incident with the wine. Cheeky bastard had deserved it, but now they’ve common ground, and his words had been, after all, only in the protection of his friend), “It was his choice, always has been. He’d say it was worth the cost.”

 

The doctor begins to walk then, after a moment, leaving her as she’d meant him to do.

 

“Solve this,” Ruby calls after, “Whatever the price.”

 

(Gold discards the lifted hospital coat some blocks later, but retains the nose and spectacles. As he stalks away beneath the gasp lamps to the only haven he knows, he wonders if the damned woman understands the price of which she speaks that may need be paid before the end—or if he even does. He retreats to the inn, where he drinks himself stupid—or wise, as it were—and before falling into a drunken stupor, his walls covered in scrawl, candle wax and chalk about his floors and pant knees, as well as a bloody, open wound on his left palm, he thinks he might just have the key, or at least, the knowledge of the price…)


	7. Chapter 7

Detective Gold sleeps fitfully, his dreams dark and terrifying pictures. Drowning and burning, that’s what he feels, scrambling in sleep—because, yes, most certainly, he knows he sleeps—

“ _I warned you that this was beyond your control” Sutterland’s words ring out—_

_I’ve never been in over my head—_

_Reul Ghorm, that which rules the night—_

_This game was designed to hurt, the doctor had said before being blown sky high—_

_Beyond your notions of right and wrong—_

_I need, she’d said—_

_Steel your mind, Gold, Sutterland toyed—_

_Solve this, whatever the price—_

_Give up, Gold, this is a riddle you cannot solve—_

Kicking a foot, he throws himself into wakefulness.

“Good morning,” Belle coos, as he tries to regain his bearings.

She smoothes the wetted hair sticking to his forehead. Her fingers are warm, and he shivers, for he’d been in a cold sweat. “Now,” she narrows her eyes, tapping him on the nose, “we have work to do.”

Standing, she helps him to sitting, and when his eyes adjust to the light of the room, he spots the doctor in a chair across. His mouth gapes, and the doctor smirks, “Don’t you look gorgeous.”

Shaking himself, Gold frowns, “It’s alive, I see.”

His colleague chuckles, “Only just.” Gesturing to the floor with his walking stick (benign enough, but the detective knows it to hide a saber of honor from the Afghan War—just like the feisty doctor, more than what the outward would belie), “Familiar artwork.”

On the creaking wood slats, drizzled in candle wax lies the crescent moon and star seal of the Reul Ghorm. Cracking his neck from side to side, the older man rubs it with a hand. Frowning, he pulls it to his face, observing the dried wax there too.

“The Order of the Blue Star,” his girl, clad too in blue, says. Blue lace, accenting a black dress, her head topped with soft curls, and with the exception of the recent cuts about her face, she almost looks the domestic picture from her housekeeper days.

“I knew you wouldn’t leave,” he says, his voice raspy, “somehow, I just knew.”

She smiles at him, opens her mouth, but then raises an eyebrow, tossing him that morning’s London _Times_ , “You made the front page.”

He snickers, “A name and no picture—what  _is_  journalism coming to these days?”

“So, looks like you’ll be needing to work outside the law,” she simpers, “and that’s my area of expertise.”

His mouth falls into a frown (but having awakened to her at his bedside, it’s a false one, and not the least believable or holding of any true bite), “I feel safer already.” Truly, he does. “Fetch me that map, dearie.”

While French shuffled across the room, he turns to the doctor, “You seem to be making a rapid recovery.”

“Yes,” the man, arm slung up, looking wrapped and bandaged as if near-severed and with a pronounced limp, joins him to sit side-by-side on the dingy cot. Pulling back the edge of his collar, he allows Gold the pleasure of taking in the zigzagged stitches, “Took the shrapnel out myself,” he says proudly.

“Impressive, Victor,” the detective admits.

“Ruby,” he adds, giving his friend a knowing look, “said I had a lousy doctor.”

So the woman told him. Fie. “Well, I—um—“ Gold clears his throat, “I’m just, so glad to have you, that is, with us.”

Victor too, clears his throat, neither man ever too good at sentiment. Across the room, Belle smirks, and takes her time returning, them—allowing the men to squirm in uncomfortable honesty—but finally, takes pity in them and hands Gold the fine, London map, “Here, Eli.”

“Ah,” he says, all too happy at the distraction from his part in the doctor’s recovery. He stands, and begins to unfold it, gesturing for the two onlookers to move to sit around the diagram in blood and wax on the floor.

Once settled, he begins, pacing about as he lectures, “Now that you’re sitting comfortably I shall begin: my initial approach was much too narrow, I’ll admit.” He takes his place at the top of the overlapping star and moon symbols, “When Sutterland invited me to Petonville prison, he suggested I widen my gaze, and at minimum, as of late, I have done just that.” Raising a finger, he adds the aside, “In fact I may well have reconciled thousands of years of mythological disparity,” he notes Belle perking up at the mention of mythology, a favored subject of hers—he unfortunately hates to disappoint her, and will have to converse at length over it later, “but now’s not the time.”

(Yes, later, for she’s come back to him. As he knew she would. There’d be time for mythology and explanations, and all manner of things…)

“Sutterland’s method is based on a ritualistic, mystical system that’s been employed by the Order of the Reul Ghorm for centuries—to fully understand the system, to get within it, I reenacted the ceremony we interrupted at the crypt.” He nods to Whale, mentioning their first capture of Sutterland, having been employed at the time by the family of the kidnapped girl, the intended virgin sacrifice.

They’d only arrived with precious few moments to save the young lass.

Raising a brow, he notes, “With obvious details missing, as well as a few enhancements of my own. My journey took me some what further down the rabbit hole than I intended, and though I dirtied my fluffy white tail,” he raises his cut palm, from which his own blood had served in the reenactment—he does not point out the numerous wine bottles he’d emptied, or the bit of cocaine ingested, “I have emerged, enlightened.”

Gesturing to the floor, Belle moves to lay out the unfolded map upon the diagram, while Gold continues, “It is the Order’s belief that the star holds the key to unlocking power from another dimension—another world, the way they tell it—the five points, corresponding to sacrificial deaths necessary to opening up said world and unlocking the magical powers therein. Following?”

Both onlookers nod, and he proceeds, “But now, it’s the moon we’re interested in.” With a swift hand, he takes up Whale’s cane, “Can I use this, old boy?” He does not wait for a reply, “Splendid. It’s a wildly held belief that within the architecture of the great cities lie coded references to the system. Since he rose from the grave, Sutterland’s killed two men—“

Whale speaks up, “The dwarf—“

“Midget,” Gold corrects.

“Le Roy,” Belle offers, “and Lord Spencer.”

“Precisely.” Pointing to the top of the moon, he explains, “Each murder was committed at a location with a direct connection to the points of the crest. Spencer was killed here at the top of the moon, in Summer home, and,” he points to the lower point, “Le Roy was killed here in his shop by the docks. Correspondingly, the map will tell us the location of Sutterland’s final act.”

“But how?” Whale asks.

“Elementary, my dear doctor, draw a line,” which he does so with the walking stick, “to the center, where moon and star connect and what do we have—“

“Parliament,” the man gasps, “God save us.”

“He’s a bit indisposed,” Gold states sacrilegiously, “but we’ll do the best we can.”

“You know I hate it when you—“

At that moment they here a commotion down below in the bar of the inn.   _“Alright, ‘e’s got to be here somewhere! Smoke him out, boys.”_

Upon hearing the police force’s approach, Gold stands, “Right this way.” Revealing a trap door in the back of the room, he gestures to Belle, “Ladies first.” Moving aside for the grimacing doctor, the rush not agreeing with his sore limbs and other injuries, he knows the men to be almost to his letted room.

“What about you?”

He passes Whale an envelope, his drunken self had the good sense to scribble out before falling asleep near comatose the night before, “Follow these instructions.”

“Aren’t you—“

With a hand pushing down the man’s bobbing head, he shuts the door on them, just as the main door bursts open, revealing Inspector Humbert looking none too pleased, “Morning, you old wolf,” he takes a scrutinizing look about the room, Gold’s ceremony and empty bottles, “well, I’ll be—did the devil turn up?” When the detective gives no reply, he raises a pair of handcuffs. “Never mind,” he says, cuffing the unresistent man, “you’ve got the next best thing.”

-

Sir Glass finishes his short glass of whiskey and adjusts his collar in his framed mirror for the third time that day, when Humbert enters his offices.

“Beggin’ your pardon, my lord, and I know it’s—uh—it’s a bit out’a the ordinary, but Mr. Gold here, he’s been making some serious accusations about you,” he says, and flipping back the collar on his lapel, reveals a small crescent moon and star pin, “and the Order.”

Glass cocks an eyebrow, “I see.”

Gold turns back to Humbert, from where he’d been making a study of the home secretary’s personal affects in the corner of the room. Pithily, he remarks, “At least this solves the great mystery of how you become inspector.”

The younger, well-built man throws a surprise punch to Holmes abdomen, and Gold doubles over, wheezing. Straightening, the police chief apologizes, as he smoothes out his rumpled coat, “’Scuse me, m’lord, but I been wanting to do that for a long time now.”

“Well detective, I have a few minutes to spare before my next engagement, why don’t you regale me with your conspiracy theories,” nodding to the inspector, Glass dismisses him, “Thank you, Humbert.”

Once alone, Gold begins, strutting up to the home secretary—whose casual smile falls immediately, “I’m curious, Glass, did you assist Sutterland in all his murders, or just the one the doctor and I prevented?”

The knighted man gives him a surprised look, shocked at the detective having discovered his involvement.

“Oh, surprised at my having recognized you? It was simple, dearie: very distinct, those hand made shoes of yours—Italian, if I’m not mistaken—but the price of quality is often the unique imprint they leave,” shrugging, he adds, “literal print, in your case.”

Frustrated at Gold’s intellect, the man moves to his desk to take up another glass of whiskey. Seizing the opportunity moment, the detective kicks foot lever, closing the chimney flue. Immediately, smoke begins to fill the chamber, slowly enveloping him.

“How many members of parliament do you intend to murder today?” he asks, and he can see that Glass has pulled a gun from a desk drawer, though he’s turned away, loading the recently shined weapon. “The intersecting moon and star: it’s parliament, isn’t it?”

“Very clever,” Glass deadpans (but Gold can no longer see him, sliding through the smoke to the far side of the room. He takes a seat and gets to work on his handcuffs), “But it’s not murder, Mr. Gold. It’s mercy. We are giving the masses a strong shepherd—don’t you see how easily tricked—“

The home secretary’s voice cuts as he turns, aiming his gun to find the detective disappeared into the smoky haze. “Bastard.”

Gold chuckles, “Indeed, and I do see, but I don’t care,” he throws his voice, watching Glass walk across the room suspiciously and throw open a window. Perfect. “I simply wanted to know the location of Sutterland’s final ceremony, and now you’ve told me.”

“I’ve told you nothing.”

“You have—but your clothes say infinitesimally more: the mud smeared on your boots, red brick dust on your knees, the bandage on your palm, the faint smell of excrement upon your cloak. Sutterland laid the final touches on his ceremony in the sewers beneath parliament, and less than an hour ago at that.” The smoke finally clears, and Glass still searches for him.

“Both houses meet today, the whole government will be present,” he adds, kicking his unlocked cuffs to Glass’ feet.

“It’s a shame you made an enemy out of us, Gold. You could have been a valuable ally. What a pity, when the one wishes for something, comes close, only to lose it by the tips of their fingers,” Glass mocks, “You won’t be here to see it, but we take power at noon!”

Taking a final puff on his pipe, Gold refrains from throwing his voice, revealing him to be seated in the secretary’s own desk chair, “Then there is anytime to lose, is there?”

He falls from the chair, rolling, to dodge the immediate bullet, and races to the open window. He dives out it just before Glass shoots a second round, tightly gripping his pipe with his teeth.

He lands with a minimal splash and rises up quickly, pipe out first, and blinking his eyes open, he spots a small tugboat not far off…

 


	8. Chapter 8

Detective Gold sleeps fitfully, his dreams dark and terrifying pictures. Drowning and burning, that’s what he feels, scrambling in sleep—because, yes, most certainly, he knows he sleeps—

 

_I warned you that this was beyond your control, Sutterland’s words ring out—_

_I’ve never been in over my head—_

_Reul Ghorm, that which rules the night—_

_This game was designed to hurt, the doctor had said before being blown sky high—_

_Beyond your notions of right and wrong—_

_I need, she’d said—_

_Steel your mind, Gold, Sutterland toyed—_

_Solve this, whatever the price—_

_Give up, Gold, this is a riddle you cannot solve—_

Kicking a foot, he throws himself into wakefulness, hungover and the room still spinning. He spots the good doctor in a chair across, going over his diagrams on the floor in candle wax—and perhaps he’s still rather intoxicated from whiskey (among other substances)—but wait, there’s a shadow over him, and Gold jerks again…

“Good morning,” Belle coos, as he tries to regain his bearings.

She smooths the wetted hair sticking to his forehead. Her fingers are warm, and he shivers, for he’d been in a cold sweat. As his breathing slows, he looks her over: only a few scratches on her face, but the dress he recognizes, a personal favorite, in blue to match her eyes, and fastenings in the front only to match his quick hands. So her face will heal, but her back pains her. She’ll live. She’s gorgeous.

“Now,” Belle kisses his knuckles and stands, “we have work to do.”

Standing, she helps him to sitting, and when his eyes adjust to the light of the room, he notes the doctor smirks at him, “Don’t you look your age today.”

Shaking himself, Gold frowns, “It’s alive, I see.” The doctor too, he already knows will likewise make a full recovery, only the sling on his arm a reminder of yesterday’s events.

His colleague chuckles, “Only just.” Gesturing to the floor with his walking stick (benign enough, but the detective knows it to hide a saber of honor from the Afghan War—just like the feisty doctor, more than what the outward would belie), “Familiar artwork.” On the creaking wood slats, drizzled in candle wax lies the crescent moon and star seal of the Reul Ghorm.

Cracking his neck from side to side, the older man rubs it with a hand. Frowning, he pulls it to his face, observing the dried wax there too.

“The Order of the Blue Star,” his girl says. Blue lace accents the gown, her head topped with soft curls, and with the exception of the recent cuts about her face, she almost looks the domestic picture from her housekeeper days.

“I knew you wouldn’t leave,” he croaks, his voice raspy, “somehow, I just knew.”

Her jaw tenses and resettles, but then she’d never been good with honest displays of affection, or perhaps simple the steel boning irritated her wounds. When she faces him her brows are high and she holds the day’s _Daily Mail_ , “You’ve made the front page.”

“Only a name and no picture?” he drawls, “Northcliffe’s more lax than I’d supposed. What _is_ journalism coming to?”

Whale rolls his eyes at Gold’s jab at the press baron with whom he had a longstanding feud.

“In any event, boys,” Belle interjects, “you’ll be needing to work outside the law now and that’s my area of expertise.”

His mouth falls into a frown (but having awakened to her at his bedside, it’s a false one, and not the least believable or holding of any true bite), “Oh lord, I feel safer already,” he meant it as a barb, but once out his mouth, he allows himself a true smile, and she too returns it, if only briefly, for truly, he does. “Fetch me that map, dearie.”

While French shuffles across the room, Gold turns to the doctor, “You seem to be making a rapid recovery.”

“Yes,” the man, arm slung up, looking wrapped and bandaged as if near-severed and with a pronounced limp, joins him to sit side-by-side on the dingy cot. Pulling back the edge of his collar, he allows Gold the pleasure of taking in the zigzagged stitches, “Took the shrapnel out myself,” he says proudly.

“Impressive, Victor,” the detective admits.

“Ruby,” he adds, giving his friend a knowing look, “said I had a lousy doctor.”

So the woman told him. Fie. “Well, I—um—“ Gold clears his throat, “I’m just, so glad to have you, that is, with us.”

Victor too, clears his throat, neither man ever too good at sentiment. Across the room, Belle smirks, and takes her time returning to them—allowing the men to squirm in uncomfortable honesty—but finally, takes pity on them and hands Gold the fine, London map, “Here, Eli.”

“Ah,” he says, all too happy at the distraction from his part in the doctor’s recovery. He stands, and begins to unfold it, gesturing for the two onlookers to move to sit around the diagram in blood and wax on the floor. “Let me begin with an explanation.”

“Please do,” Whale adds, all too ready to close the emotional exchange.

Once settled, he begins, pacing about as he lectures, “Though it pains me to admit, Sutterland was correct in that, my initial approach was far too narrow.”He takes his place at the top of the overlapping star and moon symbols, “When Sutterland invited me to Petonville prison, he suggested I widen my gaze, and at minimum, as of late, I have done just that.” Raising a finger, he adds the aside, “In fact I may well have reconciled thousands of years of mythological disparity,” he notes Belle perking up at the mention of mythology, a favored subject of hers—he unfortunately hates to disappoint her, and will have to converse at length over it later, “but now’s not the time.”

(Yes, later, for she’s come back to him. As he knew she would. There’d be time for mythology and explanations, and all manner of things…)

“Sutterland’s method is based on a ritualistic, mystical system that’s been employed by the Order of the Reul Ghorm for centuries—to fully understand the system, to get within it, I reenacted the ceremony we interrupted at the crypt.” He nods to Whale, mentioning their first capture of Sutterland, having been employed at the time by the family of the kidnapped girl, the intended virgin sacrifice.

They’d only arrived with precious few moments to save the young lass.

Raising a brow, he notes, “With obvious details missing, as well as a few enhancements of my own. My journey took me some what further down the rabbit hole than I intended, and though I dirtied my fluffy white tail,” he raises his cut palm, from which his own blood had served in the reenactment—he does not point out the numerous wine bottles he’d emptied, or the bit of cocaine ingested, “I have emerged, enlightened.”

Gesturing to the floor, Belle moves to lay out the unfolded map upon the diagram, while Gold continues, “It is the Order’s belief that the star holds the key to unlocking power from another dimension—another world, the way they tell it—the five points, corresponding to sacrificial deaths necessary to opening up said world and unlocking the magical powers therein. Following?”

Both onlookers nod, and he proceeds, “But now, it’s the moon we’re interested in.” With a swift hand, he takes up Whale’s cane, “Can I use this, old boy?” He does not wait for a reply, “Splendid. It’s a wildly held belief that within the architecture of the great cities lie coded references to the system. Since he rose from the grave, Sutterland’s killed two men—“

Whale speaks up, “The dwarf—“

“Midget,” Gold corrects.

“Le Roy,” Belle offers, “and Lord Spencer.”

“Precisely.” Pointing to the top of the moon, he explains, “Each murder was committed at a location with a direct connection to the points of the crest. Spencer was killed here at the top of the moon, in summer home, and,” he points to the lower point, “Le Roy was killed here in his shop by the docks. Correspondingly, the map will tell us the location of Sutterland’s final act.”

“But how?” Whale asks.

“Elementary, my dear doctor, draw a line,” which he does so with the walking stick, “to the center, where moon and star connect and what do we have—“

“Parliament,” the man gasps, “God save us.”

“He’s a bit indisposed,” Gold states sacrilegiously, “but we’ll do the best we can.”

“You know I hate it when you—“

At that moment they hear a commotion down below in the bar of the inn.  _“Alright, ‘e’s got to be here somewhere! Smoke him out, boys.”_

Upon hearing the police force’s approach, Gold states, “Ah, right on schedule.” Standing, the detective gestures to a back ladder out of the room,“Right this way.” Revealing a trap door in the back of the room, he gestures to Belle, “Ladies first.” Moving aside for the grimacing doctor, the rush not agreeing with his sore limbs and other injuries, he knows the men to be almost to his letted room.

“What about you?”

He passes Whale an envelope, his drunken self had the good sense to scribble out before falling asleep near comatose the night before, “Follow these instructions.”

“Aren’t you—“

With a hand pushing down the man’s bobbing head, he shuts the door on them, just as the main door bursts open, revealing Inspector Humbert looking none too pleased, “Morning, you old wolf,” he takes a scrutinizing look about the room, Gold’s ceremony and empty bottles, “well, I’ll be—did the devil turn up?” When the detective gives no reply, he raises a pair of handcuffs. “Never mind,” he says, cuffing the unresistant man, “you’ve got the next best thing.”

-

Sir Glass finishes his short glass of whiskey and adjusts his collar in his framed mirror for the third time that day, when Humbert enters his offices.

“Beggin’ your pardon, my lord, and I know it’s—uh—it’s a bit out’a the ordinary, but Mr. Gold here, he’s been making some serious accusations about you,” he says, and flipping back the collar on his lapel, reveals a small crescent moon and star pin, “and the Order.”

Glass cocks an eyebrow, “I see.”

Gold turns back to Humbert, from where he’d been making a study of the home secretary’s personal affects in the corner of the room. Pithily, he remarks, “At least this solves the great mystery of how you become inspector.”

The younger, well-built man throws a surprise punch to Gold’s abdomen, and the older gentleman doubles over, wheezing. Straightening, the police chief apologizes, as tugs on his rumpled coat, “’Scuse me, m’lord, but I been wanting to do that for a long time now.”

“Well detective, I have a few minutes to spare before my next engagement, why don’t you regale me with your conspiracy theories,” nodding to the inspector, Glass dismisses him, “Thank you, Humbert.”

Once alone, Gold begins, strutting up to the home secretary—whose casual smile falls immediately, “I’m curious, Glass, did you assist Sutterland in all his murders, or just the one the doctor and I prevented?”

The knighted man gives him a surprised look, shocked at the detective having discovered his involvement.

“Oh, surprised at my having recognized you? It was simple, dearie: very distinct, those hand made shoes of yours—Italian, if I’m not mistaken—but the price of quality is often the unique imprint they leave,” shrugging, he adds, “literal print, in your case.”

Frustrated at Gold’s intellect, the man moves to his desk to take up another glass of whiskey. Seizing the opportune moment, the detective kicks the foot lever, closing the chimney flue. Immediately, smoke begins to fill the chamber, slowly enveloping him.

“How many members of parliament do you intend to murder today?” he asks, and he can see that Glass has pulled a gun from a desk drawer, though he’s turned away, loading the recently shined weapon. “The intersecting moon and star: it’s parliament, isn’t it?”

“Very clever,” Glass deadpans (but Gold can no longer see him, sliding through the smoke to the far side of the room. He takes a seat and gets to work on his handcuffs), “But it’s not murder, Mr. Gold. It’s mercy. We are giving the masses a strong shepherd—don’t you see how easily tricked—“

The home secretary’s voice cuts as he turns, aiming his gun to find the detective disappeared into the smoky haze. “Bastard.”

Gold chuckles, “Indeed, and I do see, but I don’t care,” he throws his voice, watching Glass walk across the room suspiciously and throw open a window. Perfect. “I simply wanted to know the location of Sutterland’s final ceremony, and now you’ve told me.”

“I’ve told you nothing.”

“You have—but your clothes say infinitesimally more: the mud smeared on your boots, red brick dust on your knees, the bandage on your palm, the faint smell of excrement upon your cloak. Sutterland laid the final touches on his ceremony in the sewers beneath parliament, and less than an hour ago at that.” The smoke finally clears, and Glass still searches for him.

“Both houses meet today, the whole government will be present,” he adds, kicking his unlocked cuffs to Glass’ feet.

“It’s a shame you made an enemy out of us, Gold. You could have been a valuable ally. What a pity, when the one wishes for something, comes close, only to lose it by the tips of their fingers,” Glass mocks, “You won’t be here to see it, but we take power at noon!”

Taking a final puff on his pipe, Gold refrains from throwing his voice, revealing him to be seated in the secretary’s own desk chair, “Then there isn’t anytime to lose, is there?”

He falls from the chair, rolling, to dodge the immediate bullet, and races to the open window. He dives out it just before Glass shoots a second round, tightly gripping his pipe with his teeth.

He lands with a minimal splash and rises up quickly, pipe out first, and blinking his eyes open, he spots a small tugboat not far off.

-

Gold grabs the rope when it’s tossed to his soaked person, and Whale hauls him aboard—hauls him aboard to an argument already in progress.

“I be tellin’ you, he’d be comin’ out that’a top window, soldier boy. No way he’d be coming over that terrace—“

“Technically that isn’t the top window, now is it, sailor boy,” doctor retorts, his fragile patience tried to his limits.

Belle wraps a blanket around him, though he still reeks of wood fire smoke, and conspiratorially tells him, “They’ve been flirting like that for hours.”

Gold smiles up at her, “Have they now?”

“Mhm.” She’s changed into his clothes, he notes, pants, vest and jacket—boots too. She’s quite the picture.

“Aye, is that so,” the captain, briny Marco retorts, not to be outdone, “what is it then?”

Whale frowns, “Well, it’s the, uh, the middle window, obviously—“

“Anyway,” Gold halts them both, “you’ll all be pleased to know that Humbert played his role perfectly. He slipped me the key on the way to Glass’ office, and to be quite frank, I think our dear Graham rather enjoyed playing the role of the slighted Order member.”

“You got what you needed from Glass?” Whale asks.

“Yes, I _smoked_ him out with ease—a little too easy, in fact.” He pantomimes a yawn, “A challenge from time to time would be much appreciated.”

Belle rolls her eyes, smacking him lightly on the arm, “Careful what you wish for, Mr. Gold.”

He smirks at her, but it slips, and for just a moment they are back in that room above the inn.

Belle looks away, and he’s glad. Glass’ deception had been more trying than he’d let on, and he would be glad to have this misadventure over with once and for all, and perhaps have a better chance to speak at length with his former housekeeper.

He shakes himself and turns to the captain—they’d best be to Parliament quickly, with where the sun appeared in the sky, “Marco?”

“Yes’ir?”

“If you would be so kind, make for the bridge, port side, and approximately one hundred yards hence there’ll be a tunnel that should lead us to the sewers.”

“Right away, gov’.”

-

As parliament assembles above, the masses clamoring for answers and comfort in equal measure that the bewigged men can hardly bestow the threesome slip through the wide sewer passages without detection, quickly coming upon Sutterland’s base of operation.

And Le Roy’s infamous device…

“Behold,” Gold scoffs, derisively, “a piece Sutterland’s magic revealed.”

“What does it do,” Belle whispers—inquisitive as always.

He always loved her mind. He speaks directly into her ear—she’s so close he can smell her perfume: Penhaligon’s Hammam Bouquet, if he’s not mistaken, and it smells, of course, like old books and romantic entanglements. It’s perfect and completely _her_ and likely stolen. He ignores the urge to breath the smell in deeper, and instead replies, “It’s a chemical weapon. First of its kind—“

She frowns, “You deduced that how?”

“From my pocket, m’dear.”

Whale turns back staring at him like a madman. He produces from his jacket the item in question, “I snipped this off an unfortunate rat at the slaughterhouse factory. Take note: the blue discoloration, and the faintest smell of bitter almonds, the tell tale sign of—“

“Cyanide,” they say together.

Whale noting an approaching guard, hushes them both, gun to his lips—the two love-birds would get them all killed if they weren’t careful whilst comparing experimental treatises. “Now we know what the ginger dwarf—“

“Midget,“ Gold corrects.

“—Was working on.”

“Indeed, it’ll revolutionize warfare.”

“Yes, killing a lot of people—it’s seven minutes to noon: what are we going to do?”

“Alright, let’s—“

They both jump at the gunshot, and turn to see Belle already halfway to the machine, arm raised. She fires another shot, hitting one of the guards on the lower leg.

“She loves an entrance, your maid,” Whale frowns, “can’t imagine where she learned that.”

They join the firefight, dodging behind brick pillars, splashing through the muck. The chinaman appears before Gold without warning and they engage in hand to hand combat—the detective relishes it, feeling the first fire in his bones from an actual challenge. He spares a glance to Belle, noting she held her own, punching and kicking her way to the machine. However, the sound of a gunshot takes him by surprise.

As does the chinaman falling to the ground. “Was that really necessary?” he asks her.

“We’re running out of time.” He approaches, as she continues to examine the machine, “I’ve never seen anything like this—look.” She attempts to press a metal file between the remote control and the steam-powered portion, only to have the file go flying.

“It’s specifically designed to prevent us from disabling it.” He points to two portions, “I believe these two are where the signal is received.”

“Electromagnetic waves?” she asks.

“Indeed,” he confirms, pride coloring the word. “When charged it will cause the release of the larger chambers, as well as the heating coil, converting the chemical to gas, which will then filter into the upper chambers through the ventilation, in seconds killing the most powerful men in the empire.”

“We don’t—“

“Yes?”

“We don’t have to stop the device, we just have to remove the chemical cylinders.”

“Yes, yes, that could work, but they’re welded into place.” Putting his hand to his chin, he considers, “We need a small, controlled explosion. We’ll need a funnel to channel it.”

“Your pipe.”

He grimaces at the suggestion, “Indeed.” At that moment, the frenchman from days past reappears. “Bloody hell,” Gold states, passing Belle his pipe. He knows her to excel readily at chemistry and combustion and he trusts her to perform the task. He hears, while struggling with the giant of a man, when the explosion occurs, and turns just in time to see Belle running out of the corridor and down further into the sewers with the two cylinders.

His sight goes black, “French!” he yells after her.

She does not turn back.

The shock startles him, and he missteps, the Frenchman gaining a hard blow to Gold’s skull, but as he stumbles to the ground, he sees Whale coming to his rescue. Together, the wrestle the overlarge man to the ground, and with both men out of bullets, and his friend at the best angle, Gold demands, wondering if he’ll still be able to catch the thief, “What are you waiting for, dammit man, what are you?”

Then, he hears the sickening crunch of bone breaking.

“ _That_ ,” Whale states over the frenchman’s groans, “and I’m a doctor.”

Extricating himself from the groaning opponent, he asks, “Can you manage the French fillet?”

“Of course, but where are you going?”

“To find some answers.”

-

Up above, with Spencer’s purchased son ( _no brother of_ his), trying to scale the walls to reach him, the masses below beating their fists at his chained Order members about the doors, and still no poison seeping from the vents, Sutterland sees no other option but to flee.

He races from the chamber—and just in time, for the ambassador to the American states tops the balcony and runs after him. He makes chase, the boy hard upon his heels. Sutterland slips through the corridors, knowing them well enough for his own purposes, but not enough to evade the boy and escape without detection; he turns to the sewers—those, _those_ , he knows.

Few enough twists and turns and he loses the adopted gutter snipe (and at the rumble of the floors above, he thinks not to the fate of his Order members and to Sir Glass), he’s almost to a waterway, and a stashed away row boat for such an occasion as this, but something catches his eye, a little wisp of a girl in men’s clothes.

_Gold’s girl._

He’d thought she’d died at the factory. No matter, he turns to continue his flight, when he spots the man himself: Eleazar Gold.

Ah, so he follows her this time, his little lamb. Smirking, with hot-headed rage, suddenly realizing the reason Le Roy’s electric remote had failed to work when pressed, the reason no poison had filled the halls of parliament, and he and his own Order member’s own antidoted lungs, he follows them, thinking at least there’s something still to be had this day, even if it be only revenge…

-

She’s out of breath when she finally reaches the top of the unfinished London Bridge. Belle barely forces her body to a halt, realizing the side she stands upon does ends in a dead end plank. She covers her mouth, as she scrambles to her feet, but behind her, she finally hears the detective arrive.

“Take a wrong turn somewhere, Belle?”

Of course, he’d speak first. Of course, he’d fault her for this without knowing the details. She turns, suddenly angry, “We’re safe now.”

He scoffs, pointing to the water down below, “Is that so? Interesting assessment, dearie.”  The detective takes two slow steps toward her, and she counters with two back the way they came. He tilts his chin up—like a little boy trying to look brave—and waves a careless hand, “Run off, French, I won’t be chasing you anymore.” The last’s a tired statement (and one she thinks he’s had some practice in saying). “Fare thee well.”

She closes her eyes and exhales in relief, as she walks away. He’s free of her, and the better for it.

Her heart threatens to break once more, harder than all the times before— _and perhaps this time, they truly are finished—_

“I don’t… want to run,” she hears someone new, someone brave, say in a far away voice, that sounds oddly like her own, “anymore.”

Suddenly the world doesn’t make any sense without her detective Gold in it, even in this periphery game of cat and mouse, and she knows that no adventures, no riches, no city air breathed free would matter without him.

She’s a coward, then, Belle realizes, for he would be immeasurably safer without her, but she can’t bear such a selfless burden. So it’s to be a confession, a surrender.

“I’ll tell you everything.”

When he doesn’t turn around, fear grips her heart again, and she pleads, emotion gripping her voice, “I can’t—lose you again without you at least knowing the truth—please—I’ll explain—“

He whirls around and near shouts, “I wish you would—”

Belle feels the ground shake behind her, and she flips just in time to barely counter Sutterland’s jab. However, he’s strong, stronger than she’d expected, and he knocks the gun from her hand. She pulls her carving knife from Gold’s slacks and slashes aiming for his face, but he’s quick, and his fist connects with her jaw.

“Ah,” she cries out and thrown off balance, finds herself standing on the edge of the bridge over the Thames, Sutterland’s cane in the center of her chest.

She looks from Sutterland to Eli, briefly wondering if her jaw’s been fractured and as her detective’s mouth begins to form the words, she feels the shove, but Belle closes her eyes, relaxing into it, besides, she’s always dreamt of flying and after all, she’s been so very tired for so very long…

-

 

They fight at length, Sutterland with his saber, Gold with the swiped sheath. It takes some time before he manages to position himself where he can peer below them, to see that thankfully, as he had guessed Belle had not fallen to the water below, but rather to a small platform only a few meters below. Knowing Belle still lived calmed him deeply while their exchange only served to fuel Sutterland’s rage—and irrationality.

Finally a well placed kick to the younger, deranged man’s chest, sends both flying from one another, and as Gold struggles for purchase at the edge of the bridge, Sutterland loses his grip on the cylinders and they go rolling.

Along the way, Sutterland picks up Belle’s lost pistol. He takes a shot, but misses, and as Gold ducks, he notes the length of rope and the exact placement in relation to Sutterland’s person.

He kicks the weight at the end of the rope coil over the edge of the bridge…

Taking Sutterland with it.

The ghost of a man grips the edge of the bridge grasping for purchase. The boards creak as their nails beg to give way under the weight.

The detective offers no assistance.

“There was never any magic, was there?” He asks rhetorically, walking toward Sutterland, “only sleight of hand. The simplest involved paying people off, like the prison guard who pretended to be possessed. Your own rumors and a common lack of education and tendency toward fear did the rest.”

“Others required more elaborate magician’s tricks. Your broken tombstone, you had it broken prior to your burial and put back together with using a gentle adhesive—an ancient Egyptian recipe.” This he’d learned from _her_ , of all people. “Egg and honey, I believe. Simple enough, and likely to be washed away by the morning rains.”

Eli’s eyes go wide, when one board releases and Sutterland only barely catches one further back. “Gold!”

He doesn’t answer Sutterland’s call. “Arranging for your birth father to drown in his own bathtub utilized more modern science. Extremely clever of Le Roy to find a paralytic that was activated by the combination of water and copper, and therefore undetectable after draining the bath water. That one, I admit, might have eluded me, had not your drunken midget not also used it on some unfortunate rodents at his laboratory.”

“The wharf explosion, too, I discovered at Le Roy’s, an odorless, tasteless compound, which burned with a rather pinkish hue.” He hears Sutterland struggle against the weight at the end of the rope and the pain in his ankle and hands. “Of course, like all great performers you saved your piece de resistance for last, a chemical weapon distilled from cyanide and refined in the bellies of pigs. Had it worked your followers in parliament would have watched unharmed as their colleagues were dying around them, but you gave them the antidote, didn’t you? But they didn’t know that and would have believed it to be magic, and the world would have followed, fear the most powerful weapon of all”

“Godssake, Gold, cut me loose!”

“You of all people must know, I don’t normally let people get away; you’ll not be terrorizing the people of London any longer.” As the final board gives way, the detective does just that, throwing a nearby axe, releasing Sutterland from the rope.

“First you will be revealed for what you really are: a fraud. Then you’ll be hanged—properly this time.”

“It’s a long journey from here to the noose,” Sutterland states, and throwing himself to the ground, he grabs the discarded axe, but as Gold moves to engage the criminal, one of the bridge’s support beams falls, taking with it, a massive coil of chains…

Sutterland amidst them all.

Gold watches helpless, as the coils tighten in mere second—the journey to the noose far shorter than either man had expected.

-

She awakens to a familiar feeling, “Are we having another go with the ‘cuffs?” she asks, teasing. She sits up with a little effort, her head spinning minimally, all things considered, “Though the addition of being in public is something new for us.”

“I don’t think we’d get far, dearie,” Gold scoffs, “what with those clouds up ahead.”

Thunder sounds in the distance, and her head throbs where Sutterland struck her. She sighs, “A storm?”

“Indeed, but we’ve still a moment, yet.”  

They are quite, and she wishes they could stay that way forever: balancing on the edge of the world, hardly safe, but out of harm’s way for the time being—alone together, and forgettable, “I didn’t mean for this—I—“ she begins, “I mean to protect—“

“Intent is meaningless,” it’s a snarl, but softer, the detective adds with a sigh, “You still lied to me. Again.” His head shoots to her, “Do you deny it?”

“No,” she shakes her own, and it aches in retaliation, “I don’t deny it.”

“So what were you actual intentions?” he asks, “why did you come back?”

“Truly?” she looks down at her lap, willing herself not to cry, “I’d have you know everything.”

“Now, or then?”

Belle throws her head up to his, for the first time, he addresses when he’d tossed her out and she’d returned, but then the detective waves a hand, brushing any opening for an answer away, with the picking-up wind. “Hardly matters now,” he says, finding the conversation entirely moot, entirely pointless, when all they did was hurt one another again and again and again…

“I was afraid,” the words burst out, as if she fears the sound of them, as much as their meaning. “I—I always wanted to play the hero, see the world, take care of myself, _be brave_.” She whimpers, sucking in the start of a sob, “Turns out I’m still just a scared, little bastard from no-name Maine.” She cries once, then, confessing, “I’m still just a coward, Eli, and—“ Belle braces herself for the confession, the honest admission of her own identity, ”and I wanted freedom more than—more than anything, _anyone_ , else, or, or so I thought.”

He says nothing, and she shivers, for the cold draft fast approaching.

“And now?” He stares at her, knowing it’s the most of an answer he’ll ever receive from the lying chameleon—he’d offered her the world, when she’d wanted to build her own, and then, he’d pulled the offer out from under her. She’d not been the only one to blame, he realizes (and not for the first).

She shrugs, “And now I’m still just a coward looking for my next meal.”

It’s a lie, of course, as is his reply, “Makes two of us, dearie.”

They sit silent a moment, both staring at their demons and the Thames (and the storm hard upon their heels).

“Zosowlski.”

“What?”

“That’s his name,” she says, turning to Gold, “and he is a professor.” Looking back out to the city before and behind them, she continues, “Everyone has a weakness, and he discovered mine.”

“Pray,” he asks, coy and cold, “what was it, exactly?”

Belle gives him a sad smile, tears making her eyes all the more blue. Her answer’s obvious.

(He knew, of course he did. He’s always known.) 

Eli too smiles, for just a second, before it drops and he looks away.

“Please don’t underestimate him,” the thief warns, “He’s a monster.”

 He snickers at that, and Belle turns serious.  “Believe me: he’s your match.”

Gold arches a brow, and he aims at a tone of levity, searching for their usual sparring with words, and it comes up only two pence or so short, “Is that the tone of jealousy, I detect, dearie?”

“No, caution,” she implores, completely stone-faced, blood trickling down her temple. “Please don’t underestimate him: he’s just as brilliant as you—and infinitely more devious.”

Smirking he snips, “We’ll see about that.” With a sly hand, he leans toward her person, and bringing his thumb upward, brushes her collarbone, before dropping the key to her handcuffs down the front of her men’s blouse—his blouse. She smiles at the act, the memory it recalls to similar antics (and she can’t help but cry a little for it).

Belle looks up, and finds him studying her face. Stilling, she thinks he intends to kiss her, for she can feel his hot breath collect on her cheek, but then his hand lowers from her collar, clenching around the sultan’s ruby. Gripping it, he breaks the chain round her neck, the thief giving only the slightest of cry. “I’ll be relieving you of this little trinket, m’dear.”

He drops it into his own pocket, standing, and Belle does her level best to not start sobbing then and there—there’d be time for that. There’d be time for everything her sadness necessitated, in her own boudoir and apartments (any of them in any number of countries, for her employer would be on the move now, she senses-and she’s nothing if not quick when it comes to predicting men).

Instead, she pastes on her prima donna smile, turning coyly to the detective, “You’ll miss me, Eleazar.”

The man bends, resting on his haunches, and waits, calculating—or feeling, perhaps.

He runs two coarse and sullied fingers down her cheek, and her smile falters. “Sadly, yes.” Brusquely he kisses the top of her head, at the hairline. He leaves her then, and for all their unfinished business, deals left half done, Belle finally feels something different, some sort of line crossed, and wonders if it’s the beginning of an ending.

With a maneuver learned in a New Orleans brothel she retrieves the key and makes her escape, head only spinning enough to cause nausea, before Scotland Yard arrives to clean up Sutterland. She collapses in a borrowed coach on the outskirts of the city, having released the animal (a kindred soul); she sleeps and dreams of summers with white dresses spent in a country estate but, just as then, the rain comes and ruins it all.

-

“That’s the last of the trunks, gov’nor. I put the notebooks in last, as ye’instructed.”

Whale nods to the coachman, and turns toward 221 Spinner Street, but his fiancé remains rooted in place. “Oh, Victor, what are all these?” Ruby Morstan asks, leaning down to examine one of the trunks full of cut journals—thick paper, not cheap.

“Ah,” he begins, bashful. He’d rather not this more delicate pastime become known to his promised, “Just scribbles, observations from my work—“

“Scribbles?”

“Notes,” he adds, blushing.

“They’re your adventures,” she retorts, standing smug. In a moment of weakness, he’d offhandedly mentioned his habit of jotting down the particulars of his insane exploits at the side of his friend, the great (and terrible) detective Gold. Ruby smiles, taking his arm, “I’d love to read them.”

“Why?” he asks, shocked—rather expecting a delicate woman like her to be more inclined toward works of romance than mystery. “They are hardly anything more than an experiment to test how long it takes the detective to get himself offed.”

She laughs a little and swats his arm, “You’re in them, and I’m going to read them—with or without your permission.”

“Oh, is that so?”

She nods, smirking, “Mhm.”

“Well, in that case, what’s a man to do?” They laugh together, and holding the door for Ruby, he tells her, “now then, inside, my demanding, little bride-to-be.”

However, she pauses at the foot of the staircase.

“What’s wrong?” he asks.

“Do you think your detective Gold has finally come to terms with the wedding?”

“Ruby, look at the ring he’s given us,” Whale gestures to the enormous Ruby—of dubious origins—that Gold had gifted them just after the business with Sutterland had been concluded. “Now, five minutes here, and we’ll go home.”

She smiles, leaning down for a quick kiss. Parting she whispers, “Our home.”

“Now up those stairs,” Whale tells her, giving her rump a light pat.

She squeals and runs on ahead, and to shriek upon opening the door. “Victor!”

Whale takes the steps two at a time to discover what’s happened, and entering the room he finds his friend hanging in the center. He sighs, “Don’t worry, m’dear, Gold’s far too fond of himself for suicide.” None too soft, he jabs at the insufferable man with his cane, “ _Gold!_ ”

The older detective comes to instantly, “Oh,” he states, upon seeing Ruby alongside the doctor, “good afternoon, Ruby dear. If you are curious as to my current state, I was simply trying to illustrate the manner in which Sutterland survived his first execution, clearing the name of our good doctor, but I found it had the strangest slumberic effect upon me.”

The couple walks past him unperturbed. “Get on with it, Gold,” Whale demands.

“As you say: cleverly concealed was a hook in the hangman’s knot—my lord, I think my legs have fallen asleep. I should probably come down.”

“Victor, shouldn’t we help him down.”

Whale smirks, “No, no, I’d hate to cut him off mid-stream. Carry on!”

Frowning Gold obliges, “Well, the executioner attached said hook to a harness, allowing the weight to be distributed around the waist rather than the neck—oh, yes, my legs are most certainly numb. Might we continue this discussion at ground level?”

“How did you manage it, Gold?” Whale asks, now truly curious.

“With braces, belts, and a coat hanger,” shaking out his tingling hands, he pleads, “I do believe my tongue is going numb, then I won’t be of any use a’tall.”

“Is that so? I quite like this experiment.”

“Victor,” Ruby says—and suddenly Gold can see her endearing qualities more starkly.

Without warning, Whale removes his saber and slice the rope suspending Gold, who falls in a heap to the ground with a loud oomph. Staring down at him, the doctor states, “None of this explains Sutterland’s lack of pulse.”

“There is a toxin refined from the rhododendron—it’s rather well know in Turkey and the region around the Black Sea for its ability to induce a death-like slumber. Once more commonly known, you would have only likely encountered it in Shakespear’s tragic play—“

“I love that one,” Ruby states, “I never knew that poison was real.”

“Oh, quite real my dear, and, I was going to gift you two with my gilded copy of the comprehensive works, but unfortunately it’s gone missing of late.”

Whale shoots Gold a glance, knowing very well the identity of the thief responsible. However the older man appears unmoved, “In any case the colloquial name of the poison—“

The detective’s interrupted from his chemistry lecture (thankfully, Whale thinks) by yet another entrance: Inspector Humbert. “Sir, Doctor, missus,” the younger man says, nodding to the three, “I need you to come with me right away.”

“What is it?”

“It’s one of our men—went missing in the sewers the day you two stopped Lord Sutterland. He was the first one there, and he finally turned up today downstream. Appears he was shot in the head.”

Gold perks up, “Was it a small caliber bullet.”

“Yes, detective, it was.”

“With powder burns on his eyebrows?”

“Indeed.”

Whale states the inference to be drawn, “Point blank range.”

“Zosowlski.” Eleazar Gold says, “Professor Zosowlski.”

“Where is Sutterland’s machine now?” the doctor asks.

“In custody, sirs.”

Turning to Whale, Gold smirks, “I think there’s a high likelihood that a piece is missing.”

“So Zosowlski was after a piece of the machine the whole time?” the former soldier asks.

“Aye, the remote control was the aim all along.”

“And French simply—“

“A diversion. Yes, I’m aware.” Lighting up his pipe, he returns to his thoughts, “The ability to send commands remotely is the future, Whale, and in the hands of—“

“I’ve loaded the last of the boxes, sir,” the coachman tells the doctor.

The two men exchange a look.

“Well,” Whale says.

Gold takes two more puffs. “Off you go.” He waves, walking to the door to go with Humbert, grabbing his hat without stopping, “I’ve a case to solve.

Fin

 

 


End file.
